Polygon zkEVM, the Ethereum Layer 2 network launched a year ago, is experiencing an extended network outage, with multiple block explorers showing no new blocks added for over twelve hours.

The Polygon zkEVM team has not yet officially responded to the issue. However, a message on the zkEVM section of Polygonscan indicates that the network is undergoing unscheduled maintenance, and block data might not be up to date.

Launched on March 27, 2023, with a symbolic first transaction by Vitalik Buterin, Polygon zkEVM is a zero-knowledge scaling rollup solution compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM). Despite this, the network has struggled to gain traction compared to similar Layer 2 networks, with significantly fewer transactions, according to data from The Block.

Polygon has not responded immediately to a request for comment.

Update: Polygon has acknowledged the outage in a post on X, stating that the zkEVM Mainnet Beta is experiencing issues with its sequencer due to a Layer 1 reorganization. The team is actively working to resolve the problem and plans to provide a detailed post-mortem once the issue is resolved. The outage is specific to zkEVM and does not affect other chains deployed using the Polygon chain development kit (CDK).

The crypto community has expressed surprise at the prolonged network downtime, with users on X questioning the lack of discussion around Polygon zkEVM’s outage.

This incident follows a significant outage on the Solana network in February, where block production halted for over five hours before validators restarted the network. Solana has experienced several outages since January 2022.

Polygon launched the zkEVM to its mainnet beta in March 2023, aiming to enable developers to deploy smart contracts with increased finality and lower costs. The open-source zkEVM allows decentralized applications to scale through transaction batching, offering higher performance.